I made two dinners last night, and tons and tons of leftovers for the week.

1. Meatloaf and baked potatoes. So easy to bake potatoes in the oven, no foil, and healthier than mashed because I can dress them down while SO goes fully loaded.

2. 15-bean soup in the instant pot. Iím eating this for lunches this week. I had the beans already, as well as the onion and baby carrot from last week. I sautťed onion, carrot, and garlic, added the rinsed/unsoaked beans, and two smoked pork shanks I found mislabeled at the store (for some reason it was marked as .3lb at $1.59 while all other packages of the same date were .9-1lbs at $5+! But they appeared to be the same weight? So I grabbed the cheaper one!). Tossed in the 1/2 can of tomato paste left over from the meatloaf, a little better than boullion, and in 45 minutes it was done!

I'm feeling quite pleased with my food prep efforts yesterday. I slow roasted a chicken and we ate some of it with salad last night. I prepped all the veggies for a kale/chicken/chorizo soup, which I'll make for dinner tonight with the chicken carcass and leftover meat, and then have it for lunch the rest of the week.

The cooking time for the lentils in the recipe is much too long. I reduced it to ten minutes and swapped out the diced tomatoes for broccoli. Other than that, it's a fantastic recipe. It's the meatiest-tasting thing I've ever made that has no meat in it. Even my picky toddler ate it happily.

I'm back to my "Chinese yakisoba noodles, squash/zucchini/asparagus, small amount of meat" dinners this week. They are fast and easy, and I haven't tired of them yet. I pretty much stir fry everything, season it well (no sauces), and enjoy. For a little extra, I'll sometimes add a spoonful of "Spicy Chili Crisp".

Outside of that, we've had wings, pot roast, poor man's stroganoff, etc this week. I was going to bake some chocolate crinkle cookies for a dessert for the week, but Fred Meyer had big pudding cakes for $4, so I bought a chocolate cake instead.

I made my first chicken pot pie from scratch! Well, I bought the pie crust, but didnít realize that frozen pie shells donít come with the top layer. So then I whipped up a simple oil crust for the top. The best part was that the oil crust tasted better than the frozen pie shell. So next time Iím just going to make my own crust. It was delicious!

Baked salmon seasoned with Penzey's Berbere spice blend. Roasted cauliflower and quinoa salad from Budget Bytes on the side. IMO the salad benefited greatly from the addition of juice from half a lemon at the end, and from adding a generous sprinkle of smoked paprika to the veggies before roasting.

Baked salmon seasoned with Penzey's Berbere spice blend. Roasted cauliflower and quinoa salad from Budget Bytes on the side. IMO the salad benefited greatly from the addition of juice from half a lemon at the end, and from adding a generous sprinkle of smoked paprika to the veggies before roasting.

This and the lentil salad both sounds terrific -- thanks for the link!

We were out of town for the weekend, but I took a giant, mostly-veggie GF lasagne (the current Smitten Kitchen recipe, plus a little italian sausage), which was mostly devoured.

This evening, we had homemade pizza, because everyone on the trip overbought salami, so we used it on up pizza with grilled eggplant and some sautťed mushrooms. And asparagus (not on the pizza).

There are only 2 of us. The other half may go to a friend just diagnosed with cancer, although her kid objects to veggies in the main dish. What, they're finely diced, and very well cooked. Besides - mashed potatoes! Cheese!

Whipped up some chicken Chile Verde with pan-roasted broccoli on the side. Iíd made up the Chile Verde sauce a week ago and had it frozen and ready to go.

Ha, "great minds"... We had red beef chili, flavored with chipotles in adobo (I just open a new big can every so often, grind the whole thing up with a stick blender, and then keep what we didn't use in a jar in the fridge. It's delicious!).

We had it with chips, avocado, "mexican" slaw (shredded cabbage and carrots with a little rice vinegar) and a touch of grated cheese.

Whipped up some chicken Chile Verde with pan-roasted broccoli on the side. Iíd made up the Chile Verde sauce a week ago and had it frozen and ready to go.

Ha, "great minds"... We had red beef chili, flavored with chipotles in adobo (I just open a new big can every so often, grind the whole thing up with a stick blender, and then keep what we didn't use in a jar in the fridge. It's delicious!).

We had it with chips, avocado, "mexican" slaw (shredded cabbage and carrots with a little rice vinegar) and a touch of grated cheese.

I'm going to have to try this. I have a bunch in the freezer right now.

Tonight I think is going to be sweet potato and peanut stew. Or maybe a Tex-Mex polenta bowl.

Whipped up some chicken Chile Verde with pan-roasted broccoli on the side. Iíd made up the Chile Verde sauce a week ago and had it frozen and ready to go.

Ha, "great minds"... We had red beef chili, flavored with chipotles in adobo (I just open a new big can every so often, grind the whole thing up with a stick blender, and then keep what we didn't use in a jar in the fridge. It's delicious!).

We had it with chips, avocado, "mexican" slaw (shredded cabbage and carrots with a little rice vinegar) and a touch of grated cheese.

Chipotles in adobo is such a magic ingredient.

I think tonight will be pizza with an almond flour crust. I have so mushrooms that need to be used, so probably those and pepperoni will be the toppings.

SO wants to go more or less vegetarian, and I see no reason not to support him on it, so we are doing a lot of meat substitutes right now (for my sake as much as his). I still have a lot of meat in my freezer but I figure we can work through it and replace with veg-friendly items as we go.

Things like Beyond/Impossible products are really expensive, but tofu, beans, TVP and seitan are not, so Iíll transition to those pretty quickly I think.

Last night was a clean out the fridge soup with some leftover carrot top pesto, a single carrot, a bunch of kale, a parm rind, stock from leftover chicken bones, and the last onion from the pantry, as well as some dried tomatoes and chicken sausage that is way too salty to eat on its own.

Tonight we'll have salads and I'll probably thaw out some shredded lamb that I stuck in the freezer a few weeks ago.

SO wants to go more or less vegetarian, and I see no reason not to support him on it, so we are doing a lot of meat substitutes right now (for my sake as much as his). I still have a lot of meat in my freezer but I figure we can work through it and replace with veg-friendly items as we go.

Things like Beyond/Impossible products are really expensive, but tofu, beans, TVP and seitan are not, so Iíll transition to those pretty quickly I think.

Lentils are excellent in things like tacos. I cook them separately and add them to sauteed vegetables, then add taco seasoning like I would for meat tacos. That may have been one of the first vegan meals that my husband ate with no complaints.

Black beans and sweet potatoes are a really good combo in chili. Smoked paprika is wonderful for a meaty, smoky flavor without needing bacon or ham.

SO wants to go more or less vegetarian, and I see no reason not to support him on it, so we are doing a lot of meat substitutes right now (for my sake as much as his). I still have a lot of meat in my freezer but I figure we can work through it and replace with veg-friendly items as we go.

Things like Beyond/Impossible products are really expensive, but tofu, beans, TVP and seitan are not, so Iíll transition to those pretty quickly I think.

While not specifically going for vegetarian/vegan, my wife and I are consciously trying to cook less meat at home. For us this works well as a happy medium- we'll sub out the meat in a dish (or just make a meatless dish to begin with, like eggplant parm or something) but we don't worry about using things like fish sauce, worcestershire, etc and we still use chicken stock sometimes.

Whipped up some chicken Chile Verde with pan-roasted broccoli on the side. Iíd made up the Chile Verde sauce a week ago and had it frozen and ready to go.

Ha, "great minds"... We had red beef chili, flavored with chipotles in adobo (I just open a new big can every so often, grind the whole thing up with a stick blender, and then keep what we didn't use in a jar in the fridge. It's delicious!).

We had it with chips, avocado, "mexican" slaw (shredded cabbage and carrots with a little rice vinegar) and a touch of grated cheese.

Chile Verde is our "go to" dish when we go out for Mexican. I finally tried to make it about 2 months ago and...success!!

SO wants to go more or less vegetarian, and I see no reason not to support him on it, so we are doing a lot of meat substitutes right now (for my sake as much as his). I still have a lot of meat in my freezer but I figure we can work through it and replace with veg-friendly items as we go.

Things like Beyond/Impossible products are really expensive, but tofu, beans, TVP and seitan are not, so Iíll transition to those pretty quickly I think.

While not specifically going for vegetarian/vegan, my wife and I are consciously trying to cook less meat at home. For us this works well as a happy medium- we'll sub out the meat in a dish (or just make a meatless dish to begin with, like eggplant parm or something) but we don't worry about using things like fish sauce, worcestershire, etc and we still use chicken stock sometimes.

I'm making my dad's "loaded cauliflower" recipe for dinner tonight. I have no idea what I'll do for the main food-- probably just leftover kalua pork.

The rest of the weekend may include "Meat pies in a standing crust" (Townsend's recipe from youtube, it's good stuff), tamale pie, and cottage pie (because I saw someone post it above, and I have some potatoes I need to use up). One more thing may be cheeseburger chowder. It all depends on how much downtime I have a work to make stuff up (day shifts, so make it at work, cook it at home for dinner).

SO wants to go more or less vegetarian, and I see no reason not to support him on it, so we are doing a lot of meat substitutes right now (for my sake as much as his). I still have a lot of meat in my freezer but I figure we can work through it and replace with veg-friendly items as we go.

Things like Beyond/Impossible products are really expensive, but tofu, beans, TVP and seitan are not, so Iíll transition to those pretty quickly I think.

Lentils are excellent in things like tacos. I cook them separately and add them to sauteed vegetables, then add taco seasoning like I would for meat tacos. That may have been one of the first vegan meals that my husband ate with no complaints.

Black beans and sweet potatoes are a really good combo in chili. Smoked paprika is wonderful for a meaty, smoky flavor without needing bacon or ham.

All of this. Black beans and sweet potatoes are one of my favorite combos right now. Lentils make good sloppy joes too. I like the Knives Over Forks recipe for sloppy joes, but find that it needs a small can of tomato paste to get the consistency right.

SO wants to go more or less vegetarian, and I see no reason not to support him on it, so we are doing a lot of meat substitutes right now (for my sake as much as his). I still have a lot of meat in my freezer but I figure we can work through it and replace with veg-friendly items as we go.

Things like Beyond/Impossible products are really expensive, but tofu, beans, TVP and seitan are not, so Iíll transition to those pretty quickly I think.

From a texture standpoint - jackfruit makes a good "carnitas" substitute. I've done tacos, as well as BBQ pulled-style. I've also had them curried before and it was incredible!

Roasted Cauliflower (with some spices: google for recipes) with black beans also makes great vegetarian or vegan tacos. We were pleasantly surprised.

Edited to add: last night, a sort of peanut-noodle mashup, with various veg (snow peas, a tired-looking red pepper, a poblano pepper, some cabbage to increase the veg content) and some fried tofu. It was a one-pan dinner, even if not everything cooked at the same time (the tofu needed to be fried first, separately).

Tonight: probably leftovers of the mostly-quesidilla sort. I go shopping on the weekend, so it's a little hodgepodge this evening.

The closest thing my town has to real Mexican street food serves a roasted cauliflower and a chickpea taco. They are both really, really good. Especially with avocado. There's also a potato taco, but I think I'd prefer sweet potato to white potato.

Black bean soup. I canned a bunch this morning and had a can that didn't seal and another couple that I don't totally trust the seal on (they don't sound right when I tap on them). So I'm going to go ahead and use them tonight and tomorrow night.

Budget Bytesí sheet pan kielbasa and cabbage, with turkey kielbasa from Aldi. It was a very busy and gloomy (weather-wise) day, and this was the only meal that sounded appealing from both the kitchen prep and flavor perspectives.

Budget Bytesí sheet pan kielbasa and cabbage, with turkey kielbasa from Aldi. It was a very busy and gloomy (weather-wise) day, and this was the only meal that sounded appealing from both the kitchen prep and flavor perspectives.

Budget Bytesí sheet pan kielbasa and cabbage, with turkey kielbasa from Aldi. It was a very busy and gloomy (weather-wise) day, and this was the only meal that sounded appealing from both the kitchen prep and flavor perspectives.

I'm only cooking for two adults, so it's enough for me and husband and husband's lunch the next day. You'd want to double everything if cooking for a family.

I roasted the cabbage and kielbasa on one half-sheet pan and about 1.5 lbs of potatoes on a jelly roll pan. A single recipe made enough sauce for a double batch. With the potatoes sliced into ~1/4-inch-thick pieces, everything roasted in ~30 min (I flipped everything once for even browning).

I have a block of tofu that needs to be used, so I think I'm going to try pressing it, frying it in cubes, and using those as a paneer substitute in a quick curry with chickpeas and spinach. That sounds like a nice warming dinner on a snowy day.

Edit: I cubed the tofu, tossed it with oil and seasonings, roasted it at 375įF for 30 min, and mixed the cubes into the curry at the end. SO good.

(Curry recipe: Curried Chickpeas with Spinach from Budget Bytes, with only one 15-oz can of chickpeas and 1/3 cup Greek yogurt and a dash of cayenne stirred in with the tofu.)